Waste compactors are used to compact waste and refuse materials to reduce the size and volume of the materials. It is desirable to compact waste and refuse materials for many reasons. For example, it is desirable to compact waste and refuse materials to reduce the space that is taken up by the materials in waste containers, dumps, landfills, etc. It is also desirable to compact waste and refuse materials to reduce the frequency which a waste container must be emptied, thus reducing the costs associated with the emptying of the waste container.
It is desirable to provide such a waste compactor which operates in an efficient manner. It is also desirable to provide a waste compactor which decreases the number of compaction cycles necessary to fill a given waste container with compacted waste and refuse materials, and that the energy used by each compaction cycle be directed towards compacting waste. Cycles of the compactor only operate to compact waste material when the compactor is full. Before the compactor is full, compaction cycles serve only to fill the compactor with un-compacted waste and refuse materials. In a typical waste compactor, waste may be moved within the container approximately 80% of the time, and may be compacted only approximately 20% of the time. Therefore, it is also desirable to provide a waste compactor which can be filled without running a compaction cycle to avoid unnecessary cycling of the compactor. The present invention has applicability to a variety of compactors, including but not limited to self contained compactors, stationary compactors, vertical compactors, apartment style compactors, pre-crusher compactors as well as other compactor types.
Features and advantages of the invention will be set forth in part in the description which follows, and in part will be obvious from the description, or may be learned by practice of the invention. The accompanying drawings, which are incorporated in and constitute a part of this specification, illustrate several embodiments of the invention, and together with the description, serve to explain the principles of the invention.